


Merry Nothing In Particular

by madame_faust



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Hanukkah, M/M, Meet-Cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 17:34:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21922216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madame_faust/pseuds/madame_faust
Summary: Erik didn't plan to meet the most handsome man he'd ever seen in his life on the first night of Chanukah, smelling like fryer grease and wearing his little sister's Olaf scarf, but he's not mad about it.
Relationships: Erik | Phantom of the Opera/The Persian
Comments: 11
Kudos: 26





	Merry Nothing In Particular

After putting out a call to Facebook asking her friends to come up with a list of 'most creative latke toppings', Erik's eldest sister decided the best way to kick off their family's Chanukah festivities would be with a latke toppings bar.

The extended family went nuts. Ordinary sour cream was eschewed for Susan Stamberg's cranberry relish. One of the aunts cooked up her own spicy apple chutney, because apparently applesauce was passe. A flurry of salsas, marmalades, and slaws were prepared and sealed in tupperware, ready to be sampled. Mom dragged the dutch oven, two heavy-bottomed frying pans, and a cast iron skillet to cover the stovetop for maximum frying power. Dad even used the printer at work to create write-in ballots where dinner guests could rank the preparations with regards to creativity and taste.

It was only when they put on the record player for the annual listen to the seasonal classic _Oy, Chanukah!_ by the Klezmer Conservatory Band that Mom realized she forgot to pick up a prize for the winner of The Great Latke Toppings Contest. 

That was how Erik found himself getting shoved out the door at quarter past six, his mother pressing cash into his hand and urging him to run to the liquor store down the streets.

"They have gift baskets, nice gift baskets," she instructed, wrapping a scarf around his neck - she'd grabbed the nearest one on hand, it was his baby sister's and had pictures of the snowman from _Frozen_ all over it. "Go quick! Be careful on the ice! But hurry up! Just watch your step, honey, it's bad out there! Go, go, go, the guests will be here soon! Take care, though, not too fast!"

On the best of days, Erik had all the grace and coordination of a baby giraffe. _Slow is smooth, smooth is fast_ , he told himself as he did his very best impression of a baby giraffe doing _its_ very best impression of a penguin and shuffled off to the liquor store. The temperature switch from freezing outside to balmy inside fogged up his glasses and he waited it out until his vision cleared before he started picking his way through the huge crush of people milling through the aisles.

Being tall and skinny gave him some advantages in weaving through the crowds, a few 'excuse-mes' and polite coughs later and he found himself in front of the gift baskets, but that was where he found himself stymied. 

They were _very_ Christmasy. Some of them were hot chocolate companions with peppermint schnapps and little nips of Buttershots, others had Santa-shaped bottle toppers or included packages of wine charms representing the 12 Days of Christmas. The rest were mostly done up in some kind of red-and-green color combo that still read as 'deck-the-halls-ho-ho-ho.' 

But as Erik's eyes scanned the shelf, he saw one bag, pushed slightly back from the rest. It was a simple brown basket, wrapped in clear cellophane, tied with a plain white bow. Inside was a bottle of red wine and a bottle of white with small samples of nuts and jams, very standard cheese board stuff. It would fit his mother's definition of a 'nice gift basket' while also being appropriate for The Great Latke Toppings Contest.

Erik reach out to grab it, but just as his long skinny white hand wrapped around the handle, another smaller, sturdier, slightly darker hand grabbed it at the same time. Erik gave a slight tug, hoping that the other hand would let go, but just as he tugged the basket slightly toward himself, the other person tugged back. The basket didn't move.

With his eyes Erik followed the line of the hand up the sleeve of a black down jacket and soon thereafter found himself looking into a pair of brilliantly green eyes. Until now, he wasn't exactly sure he'd ever seen green eyes before - hazel, yes, weirdly off-color blue, absolutely, but nothing this perfectly, vividly green. Maybe it had to do with the setting. The eyes were set in a face the same light brown shade as the hand under a furrowed brow with thick black eyebrows. The face was gorgeous, square-jawed and handsome, topped off with full black hair, shiny with product. This close, Erik could faintly smell his cologne, sweet and spicy. The entire picture was intoxicating.

A stark contrast to himself. Facial reconstruction surgery could only do so much for a bone structure that went AWOL in the womb. Cleft lip and palate were neatly sutured and the anaplastologist who designed his prosthesis had done a good job, but a nice nose on an ugly face could only do so much for the whole package. Combine that with the fact that he was wearing a nine-year-old's scarf and the smell of frying onions was leaking out of his pores, he could only imagine that though this other guy might use a lot of words to describe what he was seeing, 'intoxicating' was not one of them.

Under different circumstances, he would have dropped his hand. Let the super handsome, nice-smelling man have the basket and stare at him in an I-hate-to-see-you-go-but-I-love-to-watch-you-leave desperate kind of way. But the idea of deferring the ownership of generic gift baskets to his genetic superiors was stymied by one thought: His mother would kill him. And since she had a liberal quantity of boiling hot oil at her disposal (as his current stench could attest to), it was going to be a long and painful ordeal. 

So instead of shame-faced submission, Erik went on a charm offensive. He smiled, cocked his head to his side and chuckled (he'd always been told he had a nice laugh) and said, "Can I have it if I tell you it's a matter of life and death?"

The charm offensive worked. The handsome man dropped the basket with a rueful smile, "If it means that much to you, sure."

"Thanks," Erik said gratefully as he lifted the basket into his arms, cradling it like it was a newborn baby - actually, he held it more tenderly than that. Being the eldest of seven kids, Erik new from experience that after baby number three, parents realized that infants were hardier than they were given credit for and dropped their standards for delicate handling significantly. "The rest of these look good too."

"Mmm," the handsome man nodded, but didn't sound too enthused. "They're kind of...festive. I was hoping to grab something a little more neutral. Office 'holiday' party, but they're all...very into Christmas."

"And you're the office rebel?" Erik asked, trying for a tone he hoped was coy. 

"Office Muslim," the handsome man clarified with a shrug. "It's _so_ petty, but I kind of don't want them to...win? I work for the city, we're not supposed to do religious stuff anyway."

"I totally get it," Erik agreed, maybe a little too gushingly and quickly, but this guy was hot and Erik's charm offensive was slowly devolving into a flirt offensive. He had to do something to overcome his natural repulsiveness. And usually he smelled better than he currently did. Pointing at himself he added, "Office Jew. Not that I work in an office. But I work in a building and with people and most of those people are Christian by culture or faith and they just love Christmas and...um. I get it. This is for a Chanukah party though. My Chanukah party. My parents' Chanukah party, actually, but I am...also going to be there."

Oh, forget it. Never mind the charm offensive. Never mind the flirt offensive. He was going full-on freak offensive and that was just...offensive. No doubt Handsome Office Muslim was going to back away slowly and head off to his office holiday party empty-handed. 

To his great astonishment, however, the man just laughed, which made his green eyes twinkle. Erik laughed back and while he was sure that did absolutely nothing for his eyes (which had been unkindly compared to 'creepy cat eyes' on more than one occasion), Handsome Office Muslim didn't back away slowly or run out of the store.

"I don't really drink, but they wanted to do a boozy Yankee Swap," he continued with a helpless shrug. "I didn't know what to get."

"I mean, you can't go wrong with hot cocoa add-ins," Erik suggested, trying to be helpful, though he'd turned his false nose up at that basket earlier. It wasn't super Christmasy. Just...Christmas-adjacent. The cellophane had printed snowmen on it. Maybe the snowmen were wearing kippot under their top hats. 

And it was with that thought in mind that Erik held out the classy, non-holiday specific basket that he'd been cradling to him.

"Actually, here," he said. "Why don't you just take it?"

Handsome Office Muslim blinked at him in surprise. 

"You sure?" he asked, fingers twitching, but not reaching out to grab the basket. "I'd hate to be responsible for...y'know. You said life and death."

"Oh, I'm a drama queen," Erik freely admitted. "It's totally fine, seriously. Take it. I'll take the snowmen."

Handsome Muslim Man smiled gratefully and took the basket with one hand. With the other he tugged on the end of Erik's scarf. "You'll match, at least."

"Oh, totally," Erik agreed, bending down to heft the cocoa basket into his arms. "I love a theme."

Handsome Muslim Man smiled again and held out his free hand to shake, "I'm Dalir, thanks a lot, I really appreciate it."

Erik took his hand, wishing he'd worn gloves; his circulation was bad under the best circumstances, poor Dalir probably felt like he was shaking hands with an ice cube. Or a literal snowman. By contrast, his hands were deliciously warm, despite the cold outside. 

"Erik," he said, maybe holding onto that warmth a _little_ too long before he let go. "Do you, ah, live in the neighborhood?"

"Just moved here for work," Dalir said. "It's why I didn't put up a fuss about the drinking thing, I didn't want to make them think I was...um...you know."

There was an awkward pause as Erik tried to school his face into an expression of utmost sympathy without elaborating on what 'you know' meant. 

"Very diplomatic of you," he said at last. Then grinned conspiratorially. "Still. You don't have to let them win."

"Exactly," Dalir grinned back. "This might be...ah, do you...live in the neighborhood?"

"Yes," Erik confirmed brightly. "For years."

 _As a matter of fact,_ he did not continue, _I've lived here my whole life! My parents have never moved and I've never moved out!_

That last bit could go unsaid for now. Especially when Dalir continued. 

"I've only been here a few weeks, it's kind of hard to...meet people. You want to...grab coffee or something some time?"

"YES!" Erik exclaimed, way too loudly, and way too eagerly, but Dalir looked more relieved than freaked out.

"Great!" he returned, with less embarrassing enthusiasm. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his phone. "What's your number? I'll text you mine."

Erik told him his number, and they parted, getting separated in the checkout line. As Erik started carefully trudging home, he started feeling the hard stone of anxiety settle in his stomach. Maybe he misread the situation. Maybe, hey-can-I-have-your-number actually translated to I'm-going-to-pretend-to-be-interested-in-you-so-you-leave-me-alone. Like reverse psychology. His phone buzzed in his pocket just as he was ascending his parents' stoop. Probably his mom wondering where the hell he was.

He stopped long enough to take his phone out and glance at the message. It wasn't his mom, it was a number that wasn't in his contacts.

**This is Dalir. Happy Hanukkah!**

The ear-to-ear grin on Erik's face did not abate as he let himself into the house, amid calls of, 'Where have you been? I was going to call the police!' 'Was the store crowded?' 'Who puts egg salad on a latke?!' 'Okay, he's here, can we eat now?'

He put the basket down on the radiator and ignored his impatient family - not too long, he wanted to eat, after all - but just long enough for his glasses to de-fog so he could write back.

**Thanks! Merry Nothing in Particular! How's December 25th for the coffee? I'm sure we can find something that's open.**

"Erik!" his mother grabbed the basket off the radiator and chided him. "Put the phone down! We have company."

"Sure, Mom," he agreed, but couldn't help sneak one quick peek before he silenced it for the night.

**Sounds perfect :)**


End file.
